Surrendering marriage
Very weird, I couldn't see my blog at all this morning - part of the sidebar loaded and that was all. I refreshed and refreshed but the blog wouldn't perk up. Then I had the bright idea of re-publishing my last post and the blog showed up again. Strange things are happening around here.
Rachel Cunliffe has put together a mosaic/collage of sorts. I'm in there, so if you're curious, try to spot me! (There are few enough women that it shouldn't be too difficult, I think!)
As I Wait has been putting up a series of posts on singlehood - a bit funny since she's writing letters to her future husband! She echoes many of my own thoughts. I'm moving from an outright "I want marriage!" to a fearful "Yet not my will, but Thine" to the complete and utter surrender "If Thou wish it so - I will deny myself, take up my cross and follow Thee".
It's scary. But I've been challenged to see that I'm to "seek first His kingdom and His righteousness" in every circumstance, above and beyond my own desires. If, single, I can serve God more effectively or bring Him more glory than I could if I were married, then perhaps it is well to remain single.
Can I purpose to remain single until and unless God tells me to marry? ie., Resign myself to possibly remaining single all my life?
I've always believed that when I offer God a dream, He will either give it back to me, or will replace it with something far better. In my experience, when I choose to let go, God often says, "My child, now you may have it, for I know you will not hold it above Me." Something like the Abraham and Isaac story.
But you've got to remember that this doesn't happen all the time. When I gave God the dream of travelling abroad, He gave me, in place of that "always wanting to leave" restlessness, a concern for the youth of this country. Ha!
Surrendering is hard. Where the issue of marriage is concerned, I haven't quite gotten there yet, though I'm close. Deep inside I know that "No matter what the road, if He is with me, I can be content". But I think there is still quite a bit of that fear of deprivation that Ping mentions haunting me.